Giving Conspiracy Theorists a Bad Name
Jon Swift descends into the madness of right-wing bloggers' investigations into Obama.
However, I'm not saying all of these stories are complete nonsense. Two stories that I think are close to being real are the ones about Obama being born in Kenya and his birth certificate being forged, and the one about Obama being sexually abused as a child (likely by an intel agent). Of course none of these google-sleuths have enough understanding about deep politics and conspiracies to put the likely story together on Obama. So it all comes off as pure hate-driven inanity.
Of course, there ARE true examples of pure hate-driven inanity about Obama, such as here.
But as to the conspiracy theorizing-- here is the "definitive" article espousing the idea that Bill Ayers was really the writer of Obama's first book. There is not one piece of solid proof, but many semi-plausible connections. The article was not written by an anonymous blogger, but by Jack Cashill, published in a real online magazine, "American Thinker". What is striking is that this piece is missing any actual reporting! You'd think Cashill could try to contact Ayers or Obama's people or his publisher to get some comment. But no, it's all pure speculation, much like the lamest conspiracy theorizing you'd find on 9/11.
What gets me, and I think what distinguishes bona fide conspiracy theorists from these jokers, is the purely partisan nature of these investigations. It's very hard for me to take anyone seriously who thinks the Democrats are some sort of evil global communist/socialist conspiracy, who think the worst of the Clintons, but can't second-guess Bush's motives, who think that there was no 9/11 conspiracy and that Republicans are honest and well-intentioned people.
Obviously I have a liberal bias here, and if there was no such thing as deep politics or conspiracies, I would be content with conventional liberal politics. But there are conspiracies and deeper politics, and once you realize this, everything changes-- including partisan views.
However, I'm not saying all of these stories are complete nonsense. Two stories that I think are close to being real are the ones about Obama being born in Kenya and his birth certificate being forged, and the one about Obama being sexually abused as a child (likely by an intel agent). Of course none of these google-sleuths have enough understanding about deep politics and conspiracies to put the likely story together on Obama. So it all comes off as pure hate-driven inanity.
Of course, there ARE true examples of pure hate-driven inanity about Obama, such as here.
But as to the conspiracy theorizing-- here is the "definitive" article espousing the idea that Bill Ayers was really the writer of Obama's first book. There is not one piece of solid proof, but many semi-plausible connections. The article was not written by an anonymous blogger, but by Jack Cashill, published in a real online magazine, "American Thinker". What is striking is that this piece is missing any actual reporting! You'd think Cashill could try to contact Ayers or Obama's people or his publisher to get some comment. But no, it's all pure speculation, much like the lamest conspiracy theorizing you'd find on 9/11.
What gets me, and I think what distinguishes bona fide conspiracy theorists from these jokers, is the purely partisan nature of these investigations. It's very hard for me to take anyone seriously who thinks the Democrats are some sort of evil global communist/socialist conspiracy, who think the worst of the Clintons, but can't second-guess Bush's motives, who think that there was no 9/11 conspiracy and that Republicans are honest and well-intentioned people.
Obviously I have a liberal bias here, and if there was no such thing as deep politics or conspiracies, I would be content with conventional liberal politics. But there are conspiracies and deeper politics, and once you realize this, everything changes-- including partisan views.
posted by spooked at 9:04 PM
6 Comments:
Dan Rather was pilloried for using what many people said were forged documents relating to his National Guard "service".
The difference, as I see it, between then and now is this: the Bush documents may or may not have been forged or "forged", but the underlying facts in them are almost certainly true.
In Obama's case, his birth certificate may or not be forged, but the underlying charges being made about him are almost certainly not true.
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Spooked said "it all comes off as pure hate-driven inanity."
If only. Unfortunately, the GOP knows that smear campaigns bring out
"righteous anger" against the target
and aids in raising money (there are plenty of wealthy people who become motivated to send in big checks when they are exposed to such propaganda).
So-called undecided voters are often
influenced by such propaganda, and it makes opponents have to devote time and resources to respond to it, lest their silence be taken as an indication of guilt.
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